Curaçao Treasure Hunt may be answer to Wisconsin woman's medical problems

Curaçao Treasure Hunt may be answer to Wisconsin woman's medical problems
July 1, 5:06 PM

“My dad always taught us kids never to get into debt,” recalls Sue Anne Howery.

Her father, though, could never have foreseen the long, strange string of medical problems his oldest daughter has faced over the past 47 years.

Diabetes, organ transplants, breast cancer, a brain tumor, and inexplicable losses of consciousness are just a few of the maladies that have struck the 55-year-old Wisconsin woman, leaving her with plenty of scars and plenty of bills.

Howery, who is disabled, estimates she spends 60 percent of her monthly income on medical expenses.

Now she may get some help paying the bills from an unexpected source – a treasure hunt on the tiny Caribbean island of Curaçao.

“This would be a life-changing experience,” Howery says. “I would get out of debt.”

Half-million dollar prize

Howery is one of ten finalists selected at random from Internet entries who will visit Curaçao at the end of August to compete for a grand prize of $500,000. She learned of the Curaçao Treasure Hunt contest through sweepstakes today.com. From there, she answered a question about the island at Curaçaotreasure.com to enter the contest. She wasn’t one of the 70 daily winners who won a free vacation to the island during the contest’s run, but one day she received an email from Curaçao Tourism.

“It had a big red congratulations on it,” she remembers. “Ever since then, every time I even talk about it I just get chills and start to tremble.”

In the past, chills and trembling would’ve been just another indication that something wasn’t quite right with Howery.

Long history of medical problems

Her medical woes began at the age of eight, when she was diagnosed with diabetes. By the time she was 13, doctors were reluctant to even address her medical issues.

“Back then, the doctors didn’t have a lot of bedside manners, so to speak,” Howery says. “I heard the doctor say to my mom, ‘I don’t know if I’d bother fixing it because she’s probably not going to live past 30.’”

But Howery did live past 30, then 40. Her diabetes finally caught up with her 12 years ago, triggering kidney failure.

“My biggest fear in life was that I was going to end up needing a kidney transplant,” says Howery, who had five brothers and sisters. "My oldest brother died from complications of diabetes at the same age I got my transplant."

It can take years for a person on the kidney transplant waiting list to receive a donor organ. To complicate matters, Howery also needed a new pancreas.

“If they would have just given me the kidney without the pancreas, my diabetes would have very quickly killed off the pancreas,” she explains.

Counting her blessings

Every year, thousands of Americans wind up on dialysis while waiting for a kidney transplant. Unfortunately, many will die waiting for a transplant, and some research suggests going on dialysis decreases the success rate of kidney transplants.

However, it turns out Howery – despite all her medical misfortune – has a lucky streak. For starters, she grew up in the state where the kidney and pancreas double-transplant procedure was pioneered. In 1982, the first successful simultaneous kidney and pancreas transplant operation in the world was performed at the University of Wisconsin Hospital. The hospital is the world's second largest pancreas transplant center.

Howery also avoided dialysis.

“The day that my organs came in is the day I would have gone on dialysis,” she says.

Howery also has been fortunate that both the kidney and pancreas have continued to function well over an extended period of time.

“You’re never guaranteed how long they’re going to last,” Howery notes. “The doctors at the university think my pancreas may be going.”

So Howery won’t be wasting the Treasure Hunt money if she wins.

“My main thing would be to reserve some for the possible future transplant that I’m probably going to need,” she says.

Medical bills pile up

There’s also the matter of paying bills for some of her other recent medical procedures, including the removal of a brain tumor from behind her sinus cavity six years ago.

“They just took it out. It wasn’t malignant,” she says matter-of-factly. “The really scary part about that was it was so big. It was walnut size.”

Surgeons were able to remove the tumor without cutting through her face, as they thought they might.

“That was another blessing I’ve had,” says Howery, who grew up in the small Southwest Wisconsin town of Wonewoc. She now lives in the Madison suburb of McFarland, closer to the University of Wisconsin Hospital and Clinics.

Two years ago, she says she underwent a mastectomy for breast cancer.

“I walked past the mirror and I saw the lump. It was that big,” she says. “Fortunately, they got it all.”

There are few treatment options other than surgery for organ transplant recipients with cancer.

“You can’t have chemo with transplant drugs,” Howery explains.

Lately, she has started experiencing fainting spells.

“I just kind of conk out and I’m out for three or four minutes,” she says. “I’m kind of a research in progress.”

Once-in-a-lifetime opportunity

Howery has never been to Curaçao.

“I’m really looking forward to that,” she says. “I hear it’s a beautiful island.”

She’ll be taking her roommate on the trip.

“We leave on the 21st of August, which happens to be my mother’s birthday and I think that’s a good sign,” says Howery.

Her travel partner can provide moral support, but won’t be able to help Howery compete in the treasure hunt. Howery isn’t clear what exactly will be expected of her when she arrives on the island.

“From what I understand, they’re not 100 percent sure of how they’re going to do it,” she says. “There’s going to be keys involved for the treasure chest… You’re assigned a guide. That guide will take you wherever you want to go.”

Regardless of whether or not she’s the first to find the treasure, Howery plans to have fun on what she calls a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

“I live every day of my life to the fullest,” she says. “I consider every day a gift.”

http://www.examiner.com/x-3122-Chicago-International-Travel-Examiner~y2009m7d1-Curacao-Treasure-Hunt-may-be-answer-to-Wisconsin-womans-medical-problems